Sam Pester, the Anna Chaplaincy Lead, Cumbria, tells of a recent memorable encounter.
'I can only say it was like something from Narnia. Alice seemed to be a very unassuming lady in her late 90’s, modest and clearly highly-educated. Her husband, she told me, had died when he was only young and Alice had spent many decades of life on her own. She had never wanted to marry again and instead devoted her life to her work.
Vivaldi's 'Four Seasons' played merrily away on her record player in the corner next to her. 'Something she could reach from her chair, that she was now sitting in all day, apart from when a carer came to help her into bed.
A flask of tea made by the carers was on the table, poured into a Royal Albert teacup: 'I’ve always drank out of bone china, she said, with a smile. 'George bought me this as one of the last things he did before he died. It’s been stuck together so many times, I’m surprised it still holds tea!'
Apart from the carers coming in four times a day, Alice told me no one came to the house anymore. With no family close by in Cumbria and friends mostly passed away, the walls of the house had become very quiet. ‘I listen to the clock tick’ she said. ‘tick, tick, tick tick, tick tick...' 'Sometimes it drives you mad as if it’s reminding me of time and how quickly life goes.'
'I’d offer you a tea’ she said, 'but perhaps you would like to make your own.'
Standing at the back of the room near the old dresser was a life sized mouse, intricately made of fabric and each piece delicately sewn together. It stood as tall as a person with a frilly maid's outfit carefully hand-sewn over its stuffed bodice. Hand-made glasses sat on its long snout with whiskers that stuck out at the sides and it was reading a book, made from pages of an antique book. On its soft felt head was a bonnet edged in lace.
I asked in wonder if Alice had made the mouse?
For a moment Alice went happily back in time to the days when her hands weren’t sore with rheumatism and she could sew. 'Oh yes,' she said. 'I had the idea to make her and set about it, with old scraps of fabric I had. Friends would bring me bits of theirs too and eventually Molly became a life sized mouse and friend.'
I could see how this beautiful, smiling mouse could feel like a friend in a world where you seldom saw anyone and how the kind-looking face could cheer you up on a gloomy day.
Every part of the sitting room was piled with pieces of lace, fabric, cloth, tweed, ribbon, sewing thread, rag dolls, and patchwork bears.
It’s like being in Narnia I said to Alice. She smiled: 'It was my life before being stuck in this chair. I was a seamstress,’ she said rather woefully.
'And a remarkable life, too,' I said.
Alice has gone on to show a number of ladies how to sew and create magical creatures from bits of scrap fabric, passing her life-long craft on to others.
Alice’s name has been changed in this article for anonymity. Anna Chaplains walk beside the older person, valuing their life and encouraging their unique life story.'
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